Silvio Berlusconi risks storm with racially insensitive Mario Balotelli comment

Not that age is an excuse, but it's probably worth pointing out that Silvio Berlusconi will be turning 80 this year.

The AC Milan president may have landed himself in it again while talking about the club's chances of success this season, to Sky Italia. The former Italian prime minister dropped a racially insensitive comment about Mario Balotelli, who's on loan from Liverpool, while trying to describe the depth of the squad.

"We have a rich bed of talent, such as [Jeremy] Menez and Mario Balotelli, who is Italian even if he has had a bit too much sun."

Probably not the wisest choice of words, but the 79-year-old followed his gaffe by giving the striker some actual praise.

"Mario has exceptional athletic attributes. I see him in training almost breaking the net with his shots, he has brilliant ball control."

"On the field I see him out of position, and I say to him, 'Mario, do you want to win? We need to score to win and to score you need to be in front of goal.'" 

This isn't the first time Berlusconi has been accused of racially insensitive comments. He infamously called Barack Obama a "beautiful, talented, tanned young man" in 2008.